AZTECS FOOTBALL CONTINUES FINANCIAL PROGRESS

Attendance still has high no-show count

As a spectator in the crowd at Viejas Arena, Rocky Long has noticed a few things about San Diego State men’s basketball games.

They’re loud. They’re rowdy. And they’re packed — all quite different from SDSU football games.

“Sooner or later, it will be like that in football,” said Long, SDSU’s head football coach. “People follow winners. So long as we can be competitive and win enough games, I think the crowd support will continue to get better.”

U-T San Diego obtained football turnstile attendance and revenue records as part of its annual review of the program’s progress in those areas. Both show the program is moving in the direction Long hopes. SDSU’s average turnstile attendance in 2011 was 28,435, its highest turnstile average since at least 2002 (the oldest year that U-T San Diego has on record). SDSU also raked in more football ticket revenue ($2.36 million) than any year since at least 2005.

Both figures have gone up the past two years, SDSU’s first consecutive winning seasons since 1995-96.

But there still is lots of room for growth. Three of SDSU’s seven home games failed to draw more than 20,000 fans, according to the turnstile count, which measure the number of bodies passing through stadium gates.

SDSU also continues to have a high number of no-shows to its football games, which is reflected in the difference between the Aztecs’ announced attendance and its turnstile attendance.

The attendance figure that SDSU announces at games is based on the number of tickets distributed for a game but not necessarily used by patrons. It includes no-shows, free tickets and tickets exchanged for trade.

In 2011, SDSU’s announced attendance (279,056 for seven games) was 40 percent higher than its turnstile attendance (199,047) — about the same rate as recent years.

Because a high percentage of empty seats is counted in its announced attendance, the difference between the two sometimes becomes a punch line. For example, SDSU announced a crowd of 28,362 for its Nov. 5 home game against New Mexico, a number 67 percent higher than the number of people actually in the crowd, according to the turnstiles (16,979)

Sports marketing analysts have said that sports organizations have an incentive to announce as large a number as possible. That’s because a big number creates an impression in the public that their games are hot tickets.

“The whole idea of attendance has become almost a caricature of itself because no one really believes the numbers that are in attendance,” said David Carter, executive director of the USC Sports Business Institute. “Yet everybody understands they need to keep that façade going for marketing purposes.”

Steve Schnall, SDSU’s associate athletic director, said that SDSU uses the tickets distributed figure as its announced attendance because it reflects overall interest in the program, even if it includes no-shows.

“Some of it certainly is a marketing thing,” Schnall said. “We want to show the interest in the program.”

Records also show that SDSU’s announced attendance exceeded the number of tickets issued in six of SDSU’s seven home games this year, though usually not by more than 100. That includes its biggest crowd of the season on Sept. 17, when SDSU played Washington State.